Henry Morton Stanley

Stanley, Henry Morton (b. John Rowlands)

(1841–1904) journalist, explorer; born in Denbigh, Wales. After an unhappy youth he came to New Orleans (1859) and received his new name from a merchant who informally adopted him. During the Civil War he served in the Confederate army and then the Union army and navy; after the war he covered Gen. W. S. Hancock's expedition against the Indians (1867) as a correspondent. He also went to the Middle East as a journalist. Sent by Bennett of the New York Herald in 1869 to find the "lost" Scottish missionary, David Livingstone, Stanley found him deep in Africa in 1871 and greeted him with the oft-quoted "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?" On his return to England, Stanley's claims were not at first believed but he went back to Africa and explored extensively (1874–77) and published Through the Dark Continent (1878). He helped to organize the Congo Free State (1879–84). After several more expeditions, he went to London and, becoming a British citizen again (1892), was elected to Parliament (1895). His last years were spent in further travel and lecturing, and he died in London.

Stanley, Henry Morton

(real name, John Rowlands). Born Jan. 28, 1841, in Denbigh, Wales; died May 10, 1904, in London. Journalist and explorer of Africa.

Stanley left Great Britain for the USA at the age of 17. In 1871–72, as a correspondent for the New York Herald, he journeyed from the eastern coast of Africa deep into the interior in search of D. Livingstone, who was believed lost. He found Livingstone in a village near Lake Tanganyika; they both later explored the lake. Stanley led an Anglo-American expedition across Africa from east to west from 1874 to 1877. Starting from Zanzibar, he reached Lake Victoria and determined its circuit. He discovered the Ruwenzori Mountains and Lakes Edward (Idi Amin Dada) and George, explored the Kagera River, and traveled around Lake Tanganyika; he reached the Lualaba River and established its identity with the upper course of the Congo (Zaire) River; he navigated the Congo River to its mouth and mapped its middle course, which had been unknown to Europeans.

In the service of the Belgian king Leopold II from 1879 to 1884, Stanley participated in the conquest of the Congo River basin; on the way he explored several of its tributaries and discovered Lakes Leopold II (Mai-Ndombe) and Tumba. Between 1887 and 1889 he recrossed Africa at the head of a British expedition, this time from west to east, explored the Aruwimi River, and established that Lake Edward belongs to the Nile system. Waterfalls on the upper Congo are named after Stanley.

He will follow in the footsteps of Henry Morton Stanley, the Welshman who travelled across Africa in 1889, and his reward will be to see the highest peak of the Rwenzori, Mount Stanley, which bears his name.

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